Two fiercely competitive small men in a big man's game, two sons of hardworking single moms—Allen Iverson and Larry Brown are so much alike that only their mothers could tell them apart. . .and bring them together

Out of Woods

Last weekend, CBS had its own version of Mission: Impossible. Aweek after Tiger Woods made history (and drew an estimated 40.1million viewers on Sunday) by winning the Masters for his fourthconsecutive major title, CBS somehow had to excite golf fansabout the WorldCom Classic, a Tigerless tournament whosedefending champ was Stewart Cink. It was the equivalent ofpromoting a concert by the E Street Band without that Springsteenguy.

During the two-month stretch between the Masters and the U.S.Open, this will become a familiar challenge. Because Woods isscheduled to be playing sporadically (next at the Verizon ByronNelson Classic in May), networks won't have the instant cachetand the truckloads of viewers he brings. (On average in 2000 atournament in which Woods was in contention had a rating nearly115% higher than one in which he was not.) So how does a networkgo about covering an event without him?

At the WorldCom, which Jose Coceres won in a playoff on Mondaymorning, CBS took a two-headed approach. Before its Saturdaycoverage, it ran an hourlong retrospective special entitledRaising the Bar which described 2000 as "Tiger 2K" and overflowedwith fawning testimonials to Woods. Once play began, however,Tiger became a nonfactor. On Sunday it took one hour and 27minutes before his name was uttered (in a taped Masters segment),and he wasn't brought up again until the end of the tournament,and then only incidentally.

"We weren't ignoring that Tiger wasn't here, but we had a storyto tell," said announcer Jim Nantz after the final round. "I'mnot going to create synthetic drama, and I'm not going to worryabout Tiger Woods when a guy like Coceres is walking up to the18th green."

For last weekend CBS's WorldCom coverage averaged a 2.6 in thepreliminary Nielsens--11.9% lower than its numbers for the sameevent a year ago, that was also Tigerless. The network caught atough break when weather delayed the final round, bumping theplayoff to TNN in the Eastern and Central time zones. Would therehave been such a shift had Tiger been in that playoff? "We wouldhave made the same decision," says Rob Correa, a CBS Sportssenior vice president. "It wouldn't have mattered who wasplaying."

Right, and nobody would rather see Springsteen.

--C.B.

"We weren't ignoring the fact that Tiger wasn't here, but we hada story to tell," says CBS's Nantz.